The cost and tempo of developing new semiconductor devices and building new manufacturing plants is continually increasing. Time-to-market for new semiconductor devices is critical for the profitability and success of a company. Consumers expect the latest products and services instantaneously around the world. The need to quickly install new machines and processes is vital to meet the rapid shifts and changes in the semiconductor device market. Semiconductor manufacturing facilities also face the challenge of maintaining and controlling hundreds of complex manufacturing processes and machines. Meanwhile, the semiconductor manufacturing facilities must allow major changes in devices and processes to be developed and implemented in a relatively short period of time to create customer satisfaction.
Computers are generally used to control, monitor, and initialize manufacturing processes. A computer is ideal for these operations given the complexities in a semiconductor manufacturing plant from the reentrant wafer flows, critical processing steps, and maintainability of the processes. Various input/output (I/O) devices are used to control and monitor process flows, wafer states, and maintenance schedules. A variety of tools exist in a semiconductor manufacturing plant to complete these complicated steps from critical operations such as etching, to batch processing, and inspections. Most tool installations are accomplished using a display screen that is part of the graphical user interface (GUI) of a control computer containing the installation software.
Semiconductor processing facilities require constant monitoring. Processing conditions change over time with the slightest changes in critical process parameters creating undesirable results. Small changes can easily occur in the composition or pressure of an etch gas, process chamber, or wafer temperature. In many cases, changes of process data reflecting deterioration of processing characteristics cannot be detected by simply referring to the process data displayed. It is difficult to detect early stage abnormalities and characteristic deterioration of a process. Oftentimes prediction and pattern recognition offered by advanced process control (APC) is necessary.
Facility control is often performed by a number of different control systems having a variety of controllers. Some of the control systems may have man-machine interfaces such as touch screens, while others may only collect and display one variable such as temperature. The monitoring system must be able to collect data tabulated for the process control system. The data collection of the monitoring system must handle univariate and multivariate data, the analysis and display of the data, and have the ability to select the process variables to collect. Various conditions in a process are monitored by different sensors provided in each of the process chambers, and data of the monitored conditions is transferred and accumulated in a control computer. If the process data is displayed and detected automatically, the optimum process conditions of a mass-production line can be set and controlled through statistical process control (SPC) charts. Inefficient monitoring of a facility can result in facility downtimes that add to the overall operational cost.